There is a guy near here who uses Brinsea units to hatch parrot eggs, some of which are worth huge amounts of money (Macaws etc). I went to a talk he gave about the Brinseas and definitely came away with the view that they are a high quality machine. Very reliable, accurate and adjustable too, which is needed for VIP difficult-to-hatch eggs like the parrot eggs.

I am looking to improve my tragic hatch rate so looking at getting away from cheaper bators and getting higher end incubator ... seems like brinsea and maybe rcom fit that criteria ... open to other brands if someone can recommend a few !!

Recently I needed to dramatically expand my incubation capacity up from 36 to about 150 eggs and I just wanted to try it without blowing too much cash. I looked at the Janoel 48 egg, but decided against it because the standard egg turner trays that come with them are like a long trough shape with no individual egg cups as such. This seemed impractical to me.

I ended up buying some cheaper Janoel lookalikes from eBay for like about $85 each (3 of them). They are the ones that look like Janoel and have a large circular bar heating element in them. They hold 48 eggs in turner trays with individual egg cups.

These have worked just fine for me, I would even say exceptionally well, BUT they needed adjustments from the standard settings. The standard temperature setting was too high. I had to set the thermostat to 37.3 degrees C to get the desired temperature (calibrated by an independent thermometer placed inside the incubator). Also, I discovered the turner does not turn a straight 90 degrees each time but slowly winds up at a different place each time so that sometimes it is as if it barely changed egg angle but at other times did. The turning frequency is set standard at 2 hours, but I changed the setting to turn every 15 minutes to compensate for possible insufficient turning angle at times. PLUS: DON'T THROW AWAY THE FOAM PACKING THAT THEY COME WITH. I cant believe people just toss this in the trash. It is absolutely essential to retain the very well fitting, quite thick foam packing and to house the incubator and run it INSIDE the foam packing. This gives it excellent insulating properties, retains temperature constantly and avoids overtaxing the heating element. With these changes I have hatched hundreds of chicks with about the same success rate as with my original smaller reputable incubators (IM brand).

DISCLAIMER: despite all this, unfortunately the heating element failed in one of these eBay units after about 2 months use! They come with a 12 month warrantee so I will now see how easy or hard it is to get a refund, replacement or repair. I would think there is no point in repair and that they would just issue another unit. But I don't know yet whether they will require the broken unit to be returned. If so that would be a pain to do, even if they pay for it. But the other two units are still working. Is the odd fail acceptable at such cheap prices? Anyway, I will pursue the warrantee claim and see.

That's my experience with the cheap eBay ones. Only this model (No-name brand, distinctive large circular heating element, yellow lid with 4 windows in different orientation to the Janoel, 48 egg cup turner, control panel NOT angled but square on) appeared to meet basic standards and functionality though. There were many other types that I simply wouldn't touch because they really did look like junk.

_________________"Somewhere over the mountain..." (or was that "rainbow"?)

Maybe the reputation of these entry-level incubators is a reflection of the fact that many beginners do not realize that poor results are usually due to factors earlier in the process such as poor nutrition of breeders.My experience with my own fairly crude homemade incubator has convinced me that perfect incubation conditions are not as critical as generally thought.

Maybe the reputation of these entry-level incubators is a reflection of the fact that many beginners do not realize that poor results are usually due to factors earlier in the process such as poor nutrition of breeders.My experience with my own fairly crude homemade incubator has convinced me that perfect incubation conditions are not as critical as generally thought.

I think this is largely true. I could probably hatch an egg balanced on the tip of my nose, breathing out warm air for heat and humidity!

My first incubator was a home-made tin cabinet, manual turn, electric light for heat, old wafer style gas-filled thermostat, kept in the carport in the freezing cold, poor humidity, too much ventilation etc. etc. The temp varied wildly up and down by several degrees Celsius. I hatched hundreds of chicks in that thing and built a show bloodline with show success over many years. The irony was I got it as a giveaway (throw-away) for free. It wasn't ideal but I still got lots of chicks out. I don't use it anymore but!

People do get freaked out by the silliest things though (I'm not saying those people are silly, just lacking in knowledge and experience).

For example, people leaving eggs in turning racks at hatch time (don't do that), thinking humidity has to be spot on (not true, in fact in the wetter more humid weather periods I often dry incubate and just add lots of humidity at hatch time - and get BETTER results, because the chicks don't drown in gooey insufficiently evaporated egg contents), don't wash eggs (what absolute rubbish - if egg producers for eating, and major hatcheries wash and sanitise eggs why don't we? I've tried both approaches and with unwashed eggs I end up with a stinking mess in the incubator and have chicks die in the first week due to bacteria overload - wash eggs in warm to hot water with antibacterial dishwashing liquid, rinse in warm to hot water then dunk in a sodium hypochlorite bleach solution (50 ml of 1% concentrate (Miltons) to 2 litres of water *) that is warm to hot, dunk only briefly to fully cover, and allow to air dry on a towel. This results in NO POORER, BUT PROBABLY BETTER hatching results but certainly less bacteria and healthier chicks), etc. etc. If you hatch duck eggs then washing will dramatically improve hatchability because duck eggs have thicker shells with a waxy coating and they need to be made wet several times during incubation to mimic nature (of wet mother duck returning to nest). This is essential to loosen the ducklings from the inner membrane enough for them to rotate and get loose at hatching time.

* I don't have the desired dilution ratio on hand, just know I worked it out once and it works at that ratio with the Miltons 1%. I think it equates to dilution of 0.25 parts bleach (25 ml at 1% bleach) in 1000 of water (1 litre). BUT you can get stronger sodium hypochlorite bleach much cheaper at Bunnings or the supermarket than Miltons so don't waste your money. Adjust dilution accordingly though, so if you buy a 6% w/w active constituent at Bunnings then you just need a touch over 4 ml per litre of water etc.

_________________"Somewhere over the mountain..." (or was that "rainbow"?)

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